by SFUSA Program Director Makalé Faber Cullen
The names alone can bring a smile to your face. In today’s New York Times, Kim Severson rolls out descriptions of RAFT, and our country’s food heritage, like little pearls of food wisdom.
Industrial farming, which selects for shipability, is the cause of the loss of 93% of our food […]

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While network television is rarely a topic of discussion here, Sunday night’s episode of “The Simpsons” proves that awareness of industrial agriculture practices might be growing in the minds of Americans. When Bart joins 4-H (it’s slogan on the show: “4-H: it’s still a thing”) in order to drive a combine, he finds himself caring […]

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It’s happening all over the country, faster than we can keep track: farmland is being eradicated in favor of housing developments, malls, and highways.  A week or so ago the Skagit Valley Herald, in Northern Washington state, reported that the city of Mount Vernon is eyeing the 1,500 acres of farmland in the riverbend area […]

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The UN has scheduled a 2-day meeting in Bern, Switzerland, to discuss solutions to the  escalating global food crisis.  It will surely also be a hot topic of conversation when the Commission on Sustainable Development begins meeting at the UN next week; the main topics up for discussion include rural development, land, biodiversity, and desertification […]

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The New York Times has been running an excellent series of articles called “The Food Chain: A Moveable Feast,” the latest of which ran this past Saturday.  In the paper edition it was called “Would You Like Some Carbon with your Kiwi?” (um, no thank you), and it discusses the EU’s plan to tax fuel […]

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A few weeks ago, we began to explore the concept of a mobile slaughter unit as the solution to small scale farmers having no place within driving distance to process their sustainable, grass-fed meat.
The Lopez Community Land Trust, on Lopez Island (in the San Juan islands), started a project called the Island Grown Farmers Cooperative […]

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Why should you plant a garden?
1. You’ll have lunch and dinner in minutes.  In the past week alone the NY Times has run two articles about the virtues of planting your own garden.  First up was the article about Kitchen Gardeners International (whom we wrote about earlier this year), and a short history of the […]

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For those of you who may have just received your copy of the latest Snail magazine, you may have read, with interest, about the Coalition of Immokalee Workers (”Would You Like Some Justice with That?,” The Snail, Spring 2008).  They were recently the focus of a Senate hearing on working conditions for tomato workers.  Eric […]

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Some of you who are quite familiar with Slow Food and its programs, both national and international, have heard of Terra Madre (”mother earth” in Italian), and perhaps you’ve wondered how to participate.
Terra Madre is a large sustainable food producers conference held in Turin, Italy every two years. The next edition will be held […]

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A few recent stories got us thinking about this question of bedfellows. Can fast food be slow if it’s sourced locally and made with quality ingredients? Can a small producer sell itself to a corporate food giant and maintain its integrity?
The San Francisco Chronicle reports on the latest small food company to hop […]

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